I have no problem with the Prime Minister wanting to be a good manager more than a visionary speaker. Nor do I find myself in disagreement with the five tasks he set himself. They may have emerged from polling rather than from his beliefs but that means they are anchored in what voters want. It is true that setting three economic tasks including reducing debt shows the influence of the Treasury as well as of the pollsters, but given the salience of economic issues and the need to tackle the cost of living crisis, again there is nothing wrong with the policy framework.
So why do I read over the week-end there is dissatisfaction in Downing Street with the state of the polls and the lack of credit going to the PM? My advice to Downing Street is threefold.
One, do not expect credit until the five aims are visibly getting nearer with good recorded progress in cutting inflation and waiting lists, stopping the boats, getting some growth and showing how that cuts the borrowing. People will not reward the government for saying the right things. They want it to doĀ the right things and deliver results.
Two, recognise that seeking stability is not going to deliver any of the aims. It will take a strong and determined policy including more legal changes to stop the boats. It will take management change at the NHS to get the waiting lists down and staff back to work from strikes. It will take tax cuts to boost growth and cut some prices, and it will take some spending controls to help growth cut the borrowing.
Three, recognise that pursuing other policy aims like renegotiating the EU settlement, doubling down on more moves to net zero, and seeking to intervene in so many businessesĀ will get in the way of bringing about the five aims. The more the government spends on other policies outside core public services the more difficult it will prove to get inflation down and borrowing under control. The more it gives away to the EU the more it annoys Brexit voters and destabilises the Union inĀ Northern Ireland. The more itĀ intervenes with subsidised and windfall taxes and partial nationalisations in business, the more it will deter private investment and growth.
July 3, 2023
But Sunk doesn’t have a plan for growth.
Truss did, Sunk doesn’t…so, of course, the Tory MPs ditched Truss, installed Sunk and sunk any chance of winning the next election.
Heaven knows who the next Tory leader will be, (there will be few MPs to choose from) but you never know…they might be a Conservative! It will certainly be a change.
July 3, 2023
Any plan for growth should sit alongside a plan for debt + governemnt spending reductions. No strategy here either. All sits in the “too hard” box.
After defeat at the next election Sunak will stand aside. As you say Mike, who will come in next? The last set of applicants were not inspiring.
July 3, 2023
Very few Tory MPs indeed to choose from at all at this rate. I might well be dead before we see a Tory Government back let alone any sensible Gov. It took three terms after John Major buried the party and then only with a dire coalition. Sunak is even less popular than Major. I assume people felt sorry for Major as he could not help being so dim.
After 13 years of Tory Gov. and an 80 seat majority we expect delivery not worthless hot air and vast tax increases Sunak. Hardly surprising the Sunak coup has made the Tories even less popular than ERM disaster John Major. With Major at least the economy was recovering from the ERM fiasco at the times of the election.
If the five pledges were from voter polling then why were:- ditch net zero, cut taxes and deliver competent services not numbers one, two and three making 8. Little sign Suank will deliver on any of the pledges the Windsor Framework is a disaster too. On inflation Mr Sunak and the BoE currency debasing QE plus net zero, pointless lockdowns, eat out to help out, duff covid lendingā¦ caused it all!
July 3, 2023
From Matt Ridley and whatsupwiththat. ā Interestingly @MetOffice_Sci has recently been adjusting old temperature records. The adjustments go in both directions before 1970. But the period 1970-2003 has been made markedly colder; And 2003-2022 has been made markedly hotter.ā
So why might they do that? Might this be to exaggerate recent āwarmingā for political propaganda reasons? Any other sensible justifications?
July 3, 2023
Fraud! I remember 1976 – this summer did not even register compared to that horrific heat.
July 4, 2023
LL – I thought the globalist tories themselves buried the party after they ousted Margaret Thatcher.
July 4, 2023
And, as Sherelle Jacobs explains in the DT, no plan to reduce immigration (after 13 years of broken promises/ lies) and it’s been parked in the “too difficult” box.
The Not-a-Conservative-Party appears to have a death-wish. I hope they don’t complain when it’s granted.
July 3, 2023
And I am very confused.
I thought one of the āpledgesā was to stop the boats?
Yet now I hear that the PM and govt. are actually FUNDING IOM** and the Refugee Council to the tune of Ā£1.5 BILLION! I understood that climate protest groups get money from our Govt. ā¦well from the taxpayers actuallyā¦but funding the invasion?
Oh myā¦can it be true?
IOM** = International Organisation for Migration ( much WEF support and intervention it is said. Allegedly).
July 3, 2023
mick c:
Eventually the present leadership mess will have subsided. Can anyone here predict who the next Conservative PM would be? He or she may presently be in junior school, possibly living overseas, unaware of where the UK used to be on the map.
July 3, 2023
It would be quite appropriate for a confirmed socialist across the floor to switch camps at the next GE. Once seated against the previous comrades then in power, they might well be elected as leader.
July 3, 2023
I doubt the average person could name the five tasks.
As most on here have already pointed out, politicians are judged on their actions not their words/promises.
It reminds of Millibandās āEdstoneā. That had six remarkably similar tasks :-
A strong economic foundation
Higher living standards for working families
An NHS with the time to care
Controls on immigration
A country where the next generation can do better than the last
Homes to buy and action on rents
āāāāāāāāāāāāāāāāāāā
At least Sunak was not daft enough to get his ātasksā carved in stone.
July 3, 2023
Perhaps Sunak is aiming at extensive growth through the net increase in population.āRather than intensive growth through productivity gains, etc.
July 3, 2023
Perhaps? PERHAPS!!! There is no āperhapsā about it. High immigration is absolutely a government policy. Itās the PNLY way they can get growth. Itās the only way they can try to keep up with the endless increase in borrowing.
July 3, 2023
Build Back ‘The Same’
July 3, 2023
Thatās their problem, the so-called Conservative and Unionist Party is neither conservative nor unionist.
July 3, 2023
I struggle to recognise it as a party any more, more an anguished, sometimes complacent, but decidedly out of touch large group of CV builders searching for useful friends.
July 3, 2023
+1
July 3, 2023
Agreed. Fundamentally I, like quite a few others I know, cannot accept that Sunak has a mandate beyond a narrow clique of remoaner Conservative MPs.
July 3, 2023
Another one who thinks āgrowthā is some sort of holy panacea. If the government only spent what it received in taxes – and only borrowed for long term infrastructure, with the interest paid from current income – there would be no need for the magic growth beans.
As it is the government is chasing its tail – the debt gets bigger and bigger – the spending goose up and up – so the tax take has to go up.
CUT PUBLIC SPENDING.
July 4, 2023
+1
July 3, 2023
Good morning.
A very critical piece from our kind host which I do not disagree with.
Actions not words, Sunak !
July 3, 2023
Agreed.
July 3, 2023
I think JR must be joking though about the ādissatisfactionā re polling in Downing Street.
Surely, surelyā¦.I have been totally convinced recentlyā¦.
They are doing it on purpose?
I mean wasnāt Sunak recently demanding that some Tory MP apologise to Labour about a āKangaroo Courtā remark? ( Donāt ask!!)
Surely the Tory leadership applaud their constant crashing down the ratings?
It MUST be the plan??
July 3, 2023
I see food purchases in France and Germany have fallen further. They are now more than 15% below previous levels and if you include food inflation @ 15% – they are down 30% in terms.
Germany is beginning to recognize the energy-shortage price increases are not inflation and cannot be reversed. Deindustrialization is moving on apace. They also have shortages of workers, the ethnic German population is aging and have not replaced themselves. Importing millions of foreign people seems to have exacerbated the problem rather than solving it – demand is increased and productivity reduced.
I am watching the cultural enrichment of France play out on the streets and wonder why those in Westminster are not on the edge of their seats – demanding that the āboatsā are not only stopped but reversed. Do they think the women of the MET will be equal to a similar task?
We will not only not give credit for failing to achieve stated goals, but we will damn the government and PM for failing to avoid massive problems of which they have been warned for decades but ignored.
Iām pleased the PM āfelt the sting of racismā – he knows how I feel every day, in my own country!
July 3, 2023
Lynn
Europe is dying. The future is in the Far East.
July 3, 2023
Le Pen might be the next President. The Germans covered a Destroyed Russian tank placed in front of the Bundestag with 4,000 roses! The populations are waking up – too late to be pain free but there is hope!
July 3, 2023
@Mark B: What a pity then that the UK (and you?) are in Europe! š
July 3, 2023
Peter itās because we are living through the Fall of Britain, and have done for some 50 years, that European (western) civilization is dying.
If proof be needed Threadneedle Street has announced that āpersons of any gender can be pregnantā. To indicate total confusion we used to say āhe does not know if he is Arthur or Marthaā. No wonder monetarism is too complicated for Threadneedle Street which continues to stoke inflation while exclaiming a battle against it.
But just before you rejoice Peter, the EU, NATO, Ukraine, Germany, France and even the USA are all on the cremation conveyor-belt before Britain.
July 4, 2023
Lynn Atkinson
As usual both historically and politically confused by
July 3, 2023
PvL
Do you think I do not know that.
That stretch of water between us needs widening.
July 4, 2023
Mark B – …and demolish the channel tunnel.
July 3, 2023
Excellent comment.
I read where the PM said he felt ‘sad’ at the reports stating English cricket is racist and sexist.
A report by who and with what aim? Let me guess, another left wing organisation that has noticed too many white men in a group, in their own homeland, enjoying a long standing sport/custom and we can’t have that.
July 3, 2023
+1.
July 3, 2023
Much is built on the mythology of the ālazy Europeanā.
So how come we created such a wonderful continent?
Who worked in the mines and factories? On the land?
Who made this once Treasure Island into the place where the world wants to live for free?
Our one sinā¦.trusting our āleadersā.
Even after those Two World Wars!
July 3, 2023
@Lynn Atkinson – there is a whole World outside the little old EU and for the most part is thriving by not being constrained by the bureaucratic group think of the unelected unaccoutable.
July 3, 2023
We are outside the EU, so is Ukraine, the USA, Australia, Canada, New Zealand. They are not exempt from the Collective Western decadence. Itās time the People of the West instructed the political class of the west what traditional western, Christian values are. They do not align with the correct description of the West as āThe Empire of Sodomā.
July 3, 2023
Organic and natural people growth leads to a sustainable and stable country, the importation of immigrants to satisfy political social engineering and industrial cheap labour from differing cultures can only ever in the med-long term lead to unsustainable growth and unstable society
July 3, 2023
My son was very recently in Frankfurt, staying in a hotel that refused to use the installed room air-con, it was like a sauna. Then the international staff met in a conference area somewhere, again the location refused to turn air-con on – it was appalling – they just insisted ‘ we are not allowed to use the power’.
Germany in a bad way, getting locked in to Putin is now very painful.
July 4, 2023
Getting ālocked in to fighting Putinā¦.ā
Russia is producing 2.2 million barrels of oil a day 4 x Saudi. And selling it. They have won the Sanctions War. They are winning the ācurrency warā (watch the USD find its real value). They have won the manufacturing war.
They have won the war.
If this is the Ukraineās great Counter Offensive – who still believes they are anything more than a nuisance.
JR knows full well the intellectual weakness of the Treasury, the MOD is in the same state.
July 3, 2023
Interesting, according to tradingeconomics, food inflation was:
Country. This month/ last month
Franceā¦ā¦13.6ā¦ā¦ā¦.14.3ā¦ā¦
Germanyā¦14.5ā¦ā¦ā¦.16.8ā¦ā¦
UKā¦ā¦ā¦ā¦18.3ā¦ā¦ā¦.19.0ā¦ā¦
But Lynn must have some access to some special datasets, much better than tradingeconomics. At least, I give my sources.
July 3, 2023
So I said food inflation in Germany @ 15% – over the last 2 months you quote 14.5% and 16.8%. I was underestimating the food inflation in Germany and slightly overestimating it in France – if you can believe French inflation figures.
Kind of you to point that out. Therefore actual food consumption in Germany fell by MORE than 30% (add food inflation to the decrease in nominal expenditure on food reported).
Germany is in a death spiral with nothing but IOUs from bankrupt countries (ie countries it bankrupted!) in its account. The policy of bleeding EU countries white should have been called āpreserving German Living Standardsā. Now it must have āder drang nach Oostenā so it can consume the rich commodities and resources of Ukraine and Russia – or perish.
Itās perish.
July 3, 2023
Overall food purchases might have indeed decreased in France and Germany because of the rise in prices (lemonde, 03/02/2023, āFaced with inflation, the French are cutting back on food shoppingā; thelocal.de, 04/05/2023, āMarch sees sharpest drop in food sales in Germany in nearly 30 yearsā), about 7% for France, 11% for Germany.
Unfortunately for Lynn this drop corresponds roughly to the simultaneous price increase (as it is also the case in the UK). So concluding that āthey are 30% down in termsā (whatever that means?) is curiously Boeotian.
July 4, 2023
For food consumption to have remained stable spending would have had to increase by 15% (Iām making a point not writing a paper, so rounded). Instead according to the latest graphs, spending had decreased by 15%.
Spending has therefore decreased by 30% in real terms. One assumes that if you spend 30% less you buy 30% less – or indeed maybe they are just eating fillers, as all poor people do. Bread, potatoes, pasta.
Nourishment is now unaffordable in Germany and France. You are not interested?
Hungry people are dangerous people.
July 4, 2023
If total spending has decreased by 30% in real terms, cite your sources.
āNourishment is now unaffordable in Germany and Franceā: I donāt know for Germany (I donāt go there as often as before retirement) but in a little town in South Massif Central (not a particularly urban area, with a rather middle-of-the-road type of population) the Lidl, SuperU, and IntermarchĆ© (super)stores do not look empty and the twice weekly market is as busy as before the Covid years. The prices have certainly gone up, people might be buying more store brands than before but to say that ānourishment is now unaffordableā does not correspond to what I see. If anything the only visible sign is the closure of two of the eight restaurants that are around the centre of town, and easier to find seats in the cafes around the market place.
So maybe what you want to say is that āeating out is becoming unaffordableā.
āCost of living in Franceā, 04/07/2023, expatica.com
July 3, 2023
Your party is lost to woke and Socialism and this article is nothing more than words on a page.
‘Going with the narrative’ (A left wing narrative as per Cameron) and ‘having your noses rubbed in diversity’ (Blair and Powell) has destroyed it. It is a husk of meaninglessness, of drivel and of self-preservation.
There is now no point in any Tory MP even speaking as we know it represents nothing of real value
July 3, 2023
@DOM – The fine, brave well meaning words are dropped once elected. Which member of the Socialist Party would you like to represent you? You wont get a Conservative
July 3, 2023
We have to focus on bringing a positive Conservative vision to the world – not just to politics. And stop complaining about WOKE all the time (I agree WOKE is a f—-g pain but there is something almost woke-ish too about going on about wokism … We’ve got to provide a vision and bring with energy and enthusiasm so that we get rid of wokism through practical, inspiring measures instead of just moaning about it – like wokes ..).
July 3, 2023
Which reminds me of their past manifestos
July 3, 2023
really? – for most people I’d hazard a guess they no longer care about the silly works of fiction best consigned to the recycling bin.
July 3, 2023
I didnāt say that the manifestoes promises & targets had been achieve or even started ā¦what reminded me of the manifesto was what Dom said āā nothing more than words on a pageāā …next you’ll be calling me a tory
July 3, 2023
Basic rules for success.
Under promise and over deliver.
Exceed peoples expectations.
July 3, 2023
TT: That policy was applied to my business and very successful it was too.
July 3, 2023
As well as under promise and over deliver we need lower taxes and better (at least half competent) public services but we suffer the complete reverse.
Why Mr Suank is a chap with an HND in finance (Manchester Poly) and zero understanding of energy or science our Secretary of āState for Energy Security and Net Zeroā – surely it should be āSecretary of State for Energy Security OR Net Zeroā anyway.
July 3, 2023
YES
July 3, 2023
Agree – Since the brexit referendum I fail to see a single success story
July 3, 2023
glen, just a couple I’ve read about are:
* The UK has 40 trade deals agreed covering 103 nations and territories across the world, we were told we wouldn’t be able to get them. We could only start in January 2021.
* HGV drivers are earning more money now, and more UK drivers are being trained.
*MakeUK using official data says Yorkshire and the Humber saw the biggest growth in manuf jobs adding 46,000 in 2022 compared to 2021. SW an extra 28,000 manuf jobs. East of England + 27,000.
*City AM Total UK trade is up. (read Nus Ghani on twitter)
*CPTPP is moving on at pace 16.07 summit in Auckland where the UK is to sign an accession agreement.
*The IOM historic herring industry is being revived see D.Telegraph.
*The UK has assumed the Presidency of the UN Security Council.
July 3, 2023
The real problem that we face is the refusal of this government to support the green revolution with the large number of high-tech jobs that it promises
We must not allow the fossil fuel cartels to ever hold the country to ransom as they did last winter. We need more onshore wind and solar energy, investment in the electricity distribution network and support for the grid-scale energy storage solutions deveoped by British universities.
July 3, 2023
SG: the reason we rely on fossil fuel is because the ‘green renewables’ are useless without backup fossil fuels.
July 3, 2023
@Shirley+M
What a rubbish post. Renewable electricity last winter displaced more than a third of the UKās entire annual gas demand for power generation. Without it, the UK would have had to increase net gas imports by more than 22 per cent (including gas imported via pipeline)
Generating the same amount of electricity using CCGT would have required around 95TWh of gas ā equal to 110 tankers of LNG – or the amount more than 10 million UK homes would burn over the winter.
In 2022, UK renewables provided 38 per cent of the countryās electricity generation, nearly as much as gas (at 40 per cent) and we became a NET ELECTRICITY EXPORTER for the first time since 2010.
Today, wind and solar have generated ~75% of our electricity demand and we have been exporting 8% to the French. If you dont know what you are talking about, why do you bother to post
July 3, 2023
Electricity exports were enabled last year by burning extra gas, so they resulted in higher gas imports than otherwise would have been necessary. In the winter we depended on interconnector imports to keep the lights on, much of it dependent on coal fired generation in the Netherlands and Germany (exporting to France to allow them to export to the UK).
It would help if you knew what you were talking about when you post.
July 3, 2023
Oh Sakara do please go and study some real Physics, Energy & Energy Economics. Take PPE Sunak, PPE Hunt and HND finance Grant Shapps with you too as they are clueless on this too.
About the only positive I have heard about Sunak is Zak Goldsmith resigning as Suanak was not taking net zero seriously he claimed. Let us hope Zak is right.
āgrid-scale energy storageā the best ones are stores of natural gas, diesel or piles of coal! Battery or other storage systems vastly expensive and hugely energy wasteful too! Mug up on that too Sakira.
July 3, 2023
Sakara
What more do you want the Government to do, they have already subsidised so called renewables with taxpayer money, introduced a so called green levy tax on our bills, a windfall tax on fossil fuel profits, double taxation on ICE car fuel, vehicle excise duty on ICE vehicles.
My electricity supplier “Claims” that they only use 100% renewable power from their own wind farms, so where does my electricity come from when the wind does not blow, and why am I paying the same as everyone else for my electricity if it is all renewables ?
It simply is a lie !
The whole power supply scam is a farce, you know, it and the general public know it.
Yes of course we need to conserve the planets resources, but in a sensible and controlled manner with the evolution and development of alternatives, but those alternatives have to be proven to be efficient, and financially sound, the present policies are neither.
July 3, 2023
@Sakara Gold – the first time I have found myself disagreeing with you. āfossil fuel cartels to ever hold the country to ransomā it was this Conservative Government that held everyone to ransom they ditched UK energy in favour of highly volatile mainly foreign Government owned energy. So the whims of Political Groups that we didnāt vote for says how energy will work in the UK
July 3, 2023
Let’s start with the 300,000 employed in North Sea Oil & Gas SG.
Please detail exactly what “high tech jobs” will replace this work and how will you retrain the people currently employed in N.Sea work to these new ‘green’ jobs. Because if (like much else connected with this eco-wishful thinking) you don’t actully know, then I would suggest that the only revolution you are likley to see is when unemployment in this country starts to climb back up again….and like inflation, it will be very hard to turn around.
July 3, 2023
+1
July 4, 2023
@IanT
The UKās low carbon economy is now worth Ā£200.8bn, four times the size of the countryās manufacturing sector, with growth expected to accelerate even faster in the coming years. More than 90,000 businesses employ in excess of 1.7 million people in the green economy. Using similar methodology, McKinsley found last year that the manufacturing sector is worth only Ā£55.6bn and the construction sector is worth Ā£132.9bn.
From communal food gardens, regional home retrofit programmes, regenerative farmers, biogas producers, private recycling companies, hydrogen jet fuel, net zero whisky, district heating systems using hot water extracted from ex coal mines, solar park maintenance firms, HVDC manufacturers and energy storage systems, British entrepreneurs are involved in thousands of new company start-ups in the green economy.
At the Port of Tyne, hundreds of acres of brownfield land on either side of the river have been cleared to make room for the green energy companies which are involved in building the worldās largest offshore windfarm (the Dogger Bank Array). Which will be built completely free of subsidy, the output will allow us to export cheap renewable electricity to the EU via the interconnectors.
Why donāt you research the subject instead of spouting the fossil fuel lobby bullshit that is perpetually being placed in the Tory press?
July 3, 2023
Are you describing the Green Party or Tory Party policies
July 3, 2023
Yes letās swap real jobs for āpromisedā jobs. We know we can depend on politicianās promises! How do you propose to increase onshore, or for that matter offshore wind? Blow? THERE IS NO WIND IN WINTER. I live 55 degrees north, that is in the middle of the island of Great Britain. Iām on the same latitude as Moscow. There is not enough sun to warm an earthworm.
British Universities have developed nothing – much less āgrid-scale energy storage! They are too busy dispensing Batchelor degrees in āLatin American Dancingā.
Enough of the lies and fantasies of the Thunberg school drop-outs.
We need rational and sentient people to produce energy – and fast!
July 3, 2023
Total gobledegook Sakara! Windmills were scrapped years ago as they did not fullfill the need, and were not efficient, things have not changed. As for solar, that does not have long life efficiency , they never get to breakeven and profit.
We must maintain the present state until ingenuity finds better.
Just to show how stupid the greenies are ! What lubricates the main gearboxes in there windmills?
Oil of course- they would not last an hour without lashings of the stuff.
Its time inky-fingered pen pushers left it all to real engineers. They are the ones who always brought advances.
July 3, 2023
āWhat lubricates the main gearboxes in there windmillsā: not oil but polyalphaolefins (some polymer-type products still dependent on natural gas to get the ethylene that enters the chemical reactions in their manufacturing).
July 4, 2023
So – Oil. Why donāt you just write āI agreeā?
July 5, 2023
If you donāt know the difference between oil and a synthetic lubricant, thatās your problem not mine.
July 3, 2023
All you are doing is trading one ‘cartel’ for another.
And as a BEV owner you should be fully aware that both BP and Shell provide charging points for BEV’s. A bit pricey though.
July 3, 2023
On the contrary, it is the pursuit of Net Zero that is deeply damaging for the economy. It has resulted in the loss of many jobs and whole industries, with more to come following the latest tightening of the noose by UK ETS. It has resulted in extremely high energy prices because we have no reliable supply due to over-dependence on intermittent renewables, and must bid against the Continent to keep the lights on. Industry has already been told by National Grid it should shut down whenever supply gets tighter next winter.
July 4, 2023
So instead of reliable fossil fuels, you want us at the mercy of the elements. How very Medieval of you.
July 3, 2023
Following the disastrous privatisation of the water and sewage dumping industry, the urgent problem of the imminent failure of several of the English water companies must be addressed. Michael Howard was warned in 1987 what would happen if private equity firms were allowed to buy into our monopoly infrastructure organisations with no debt. How long is it going to be before the drinking water is contaminated? The next NHS crisis ay well be having to deal with the return of cholera
July 3, 2023
Agreeā¦exactly what happened when greedy speculators bought up ( or pinched!) the London Spas ( and there were lots of them).
Careless digging and building and the water got mixed with sewage.
Huge outbreaks of cholera in mid 1800s
Stillā¦the Great Reset does = dragging us back into the past!
July 3, 2023
Maybe all of us opposed to it should rename the Great Reset ‘The Great Leap Forward’? China had a Great Leap Forward from 1958 to -62 and 5% of its population died from starvation.
On people in boats, I’m no expert on immigration or asylum law but I very briefly looked at EU and UK population growth. It seemed that the number of people in the UK has grown faster than the number of people in the EU (or in the rest of the EU, in the period before the UK departed.) JR may wish to check this more carefully and if appropriate start asking some hard questions.
July 3, 2023
Sakara
Agree, the basic fuel of life, and certainly Water, Power, Sewerage treatment and the like, should not be in the hands of private, and in many cases foreign, ownership.
July 4, 2023
Alan, and as it was allowed to go into private foreign hands, the regulators should have been doing their job properly to protect us from them loaning to pay dividends to themselves, I believe that is what the accusation is.
The UK papers don’t seem to explain facts about water fully, but there is an interesting chap called Steve Loftus on twitter; take a look at his thread on UK water.
July 3, 2023
@Sakara Gold – Privatising an infrastructure project where competition is not possible was also mad. State owning but then privately run limited by fixed term contracts, would actually work for all. Government are rubbish at running anything
The current situation where the buyer leverages their debt for the purchase on the assets of the Company is sheer madness on many levels. The taxpayer paid for the infrastructure so then gets short changed. Then our 2 Chancellors ramp up the interest rates to compensate for their ‘refusal to manage’ and those that leveraged debt go pear shape.
At the moment these companis need to go bust, with the State gaining ownership for nothing, then contract out ‘just’ the-day-to-day running on fixed time contracts.
July 3, 2023
So how do you explain the fact that the fully state-owned Scottish Water is performing as badly if not worse than Thames Water across the board ? They only escape scrutiny because they don’t even monitor sewage discharges !
July 3, 2023
Everything state-owned in Scotland is a mess – thought you might have noticed – the Scots themselves certainly have.
July 4, 2023
āEverything state owned is a messā always was, always will be. Thought you might have noticed.
July 3, 2023
SK there is a very interesting chap on twitter called Steve Loftus who often talks about the state of UK water and Energy. He has a pinned tweet called ‘UK Waters Megathread’ it’s interesting. You don’t need a twitter account to read it.
July 3, 2023
It is cruel to refer to those bringing cholera to our shores, and much else, as a āsewer dumpingā industry, but I do not disagree. They are also a CO2 producing package – every time they breathe out.
Time to reverse the boats, empty the hotels, hostels cruise liners, hospital beds and jails of all the non-British people who have no right to be here.
July 3, 2023
Poor regulation regulation by the government and regulators. As so often happens with regulators they often collude to extort from tax payers and/or bill payers. Often moving from one company to the regulators and the reverse.
July 3, 2023
Michael Howard wrote a very good piece int the Sun Tel this last weekend, expalining why water was privatised. You should read it. Our water company is excellent, being a revival of the original Victorian one, as the railway companies could have been too, had it not been for the EU insisting on them being all broken up, including the track.
July 3, 2023
Privatisation initially worked well to bring fresh investment to the industry which had been starved of funds under decades of state control and ownership.
The subsequent poor performance of the water industry is the result of adhering to the EU Water Directive which limits permitted investment and demands that water be rationed by price. OFWAT follows the Directive (still enshrined in UK law), not consumer interest, much like OFGEM in the energy sector in nits pursuit of Net Zero at whatever cost to consumers.
July 3, 2023
The thinking public is coming to realise that the Government justs talks and does nothing to help the UK citizen. The Government follows the wishes of organisations outside the UK even if no benefit and allways detriment to the UK. We have managers running the NHS, and see where that has got that organisation. We now have a manager running the country, not a leader, just a follower.
The only thing the Government has done for which you can see a result is fuelling the war with Russia. We will have to let history judge if this was in anyway a benefit to the UK and worth the financial cost (if you ignore the death and destruction on both sides that is) The Russian army was not coming across the channel in small boats.
July 3, 2023
The foreign secretary James Cleverly will welcome a new era of refreshed āclose and friendly UK-EU cooperationā as he addresses the UK-EU Parliamentary Partnership Assembly (PPA) in Brussels today. CityAM
But he won’t mention the illegal immigration today
https://www.cityam.com/cleverly-to-hail-new-chapter-in-uk-eu-relationship-in-brussels-today/
July 3, 2023
Your last sentence is telling. If Russia had won the the war already, they may well be coming in rather big boats. The Ukraine is fighting for all of us, so we don’t have to. At least, so far they have weakened Russia to a great extent and proved that the mighty Russia we all thought existed is pretty poor at fighting wars and cannot so far subdue a neighbour which is about one third its size and previously with comparatively little forces to speak of. Russia also got kicked out of Afghanistan like we did by people with little more than small arms and pitchforks.
July 3, 2023
Graham 1946
Er no, you shouldnāt believe the MSM about the war in Ukraine, theyāre being extremely economical with the actualite
Ā£4.6 billion of our money spent so far
July 4, 2023
Perhaps you could share with us the privileged information you get then as you seem to know all about it. Please educate me and give some references not available to the rest of us. Why do you think it has taken mighty Russia over a year to achieve not much other than destroy much of Ukraine. Why do you think they target civilians if not in desperation?
July 3, 2023
Why do you think Russia intends to invade the U.K.?
July 4, 2023
I would welcome Putin. He may be as corrupt as our politicians but at least he respects Christian values and has no time for wokery.
July 4, 2023
Join the club. He is an Orthodox Christian. No evidence of corruption.
That is not to claim that many in the Russian state are not corrupt. Why should their state be different from ours after all?
July 4, 2023
OMG. BREATHTAKING…….
July 4, 2023
He won’t. He can’t. But do you think he would have stopped at Ukraine, when he said his mission is to restore the USSR. He is mad. He is bad. Are you willing to take the chance on someone who said he would not invade the Ukraine, then did. Russians are notoriously unreliable and his people all back him.
July 8, 2023
The operation was small at the outset, to facilitate an agreement, most likely. These negotiated agreements don’t seem to hold why? If this continues a buffer area will be taken by Russia in lieu of security guarantees.
Why would an adversary , trust any of our politicians? We don’t.
Russia hardly need land or resources, it would have a reasonable need for peace and security.
July 3, 2023
Agreed John.
July 3, 2023
‘fuelling the war’ – what an outrageous remark! ‘helping to defend against the invader rape and pillagers’ more like.
July 3, 2023
Sir John, all good as far as it goes but the fundamental problems remain.
First, take the five tasks. It is because they emerged from polling rather than from Sunak’s and the Party’s core beliefs that the policies derived from polling will be ineffective. Even if the policies are perfectly formed there will be opposition and the Government does not have the will to overcome opposition and deliver the required results because too many Tories don’y believe in them.
Second, you rightly say that “seeking stability is not going to deliver any of the aims. It will take a strong and determined policy including more legal changes to stop the boats.”
By strong policy, do you mean strong political will? they are not the same things in my book. We had a saying in the Navy, a workable good enough plan that people can unite behind is better than a perfect plan not everyone supports. That is the equivalent of political will and gaining it within the Party – within any party – takes more than technocratic management. It takes leadership. And leadership fails without core beliefs – the moral battle as they say in the Army.
The acid test of all this and the policy that would have the most visible and galvanising effect is stopping the boats is. Getting the legislation in place is necessary but against strong opposition concessions will be made, and even if passed, loopholes will be found and it may prove ineffective. Most of the difficulties arise and will continue to arise because the illegal migrants succeed in entering British territory. To succeed the policy must include action in The Channel. The UK already has all the cover in international and domestic law it needs to do this, as I have stated many times and has now been picked by the Reform Party. In pursuit of stability and lacking political will, again because half the Party does not believe in stopping the boats other than in order to win votes so as to remain in power, it will not happen.
Stopping the boats will require political will, belief, leadership and the party to be united. The Conservatives have none of these.
July 3, 2023
@Peter Gardner I guess simply having a Conservative Government should solve things overnight. It would appear the Conservative Party doesnāt want that.
July 3, 2023
Sunak has no core beliefs, neither apparently does the āConservative Partyā which is why they need nursery school lessons from Redwood.
July 3, 2023
no core beliefs except looking after No.1
July 3, 2023
…and getting a green card
July 4, 2023
šš¤£out of the frying panā¦
July 3, 2023
+1
July 3, 2023
I think the immigration problems go far beyond arrivals by rubber boat. The numbers coming in legally far exceed what we can cope with.
July 3, 2023
Mrs Thatcher who, whether you agreed with her policies or not, didn’t just talk the talk she walked the walk. She delivered. She also once said “the problem with today’s politicians is they make a speech and think they have achieved something. They haven’t, they’ve just made a speech.”
That applies to Sunak and the Not-a-Conservative-Government in spades. All talk; no effective action and no results. We can see the country going to hell in a hand-cart before our eyes and the Not-a-Conservative-Government is doing nothing to stop it …. which I believe is because they don’t want to. They are fully signed up to the WEF’s globalist Agenda. They won’t deviate from the Reset.
And that’s why many conservatively-inclined voters have abandoned the party and don’t care if Labour gets in: they will simply deliver the same policies.
July 3, 2023
As I interpret the WEF agenda, a ‘them and us’ future world, where a few of ‘them’ rule and the rest of us are the remaining worker-bees, after a worldwide ‘die-off’ of the unnecessary, lesser bees; do these incompetent pretend Conservatives think they’ll be in the ‘them’ category?
July 3, 2023
@Donna – I think Sunak and Co, donāt understand what management means when you have been paid and empowered to run a Country. As you say in repeating Maggie T āthe problem with todayās politicians is they make a speech and think they have achieved something. They havenāt, theyāve just made a speech.ā
Day in day out they seek the personal self gratification of media recognition as an excuse to shy away from responsibility and being a Conservative. Although as you also have picked up on, this is an out and out Socialist WEF Government going for the āGreat Resetā – Destruction in process is the only aim
July 3, 2023
We all need to be honest, we just dont have a conservative government – lets look at their achievements to date, higher taxation, higher immigration, higher cost of living, more green policies, more restrictions of public movement ie LTN, ULEZ, 15min Cities etc, continued EU law …..NO BREXIT
July 3, 2023
now to find a way to unseat this socialist government?
July 3, 2023
So essentially Sunak and his cohorts are useless…………..yup!
July 3, 2023
Albion
Trouble is ALL decisions are made with net zero in mind. My husband read yesterday that even medical decisions are being made with net zero at the heart of thinking. Apparently, according to the BMJ, medicine and medical procedures use a lot of carbon; so globally that has to change! I skim read the rest, but basically medical care must come second to climate emergency considerations!
July 3, 2023
One area is the use of nitrous oxide in anaesthesia. According to data I found, the global use for that purpose is equal to just one power station’s NOx output. Our use is utterly trivial, and confers patient benefit that is not being weighed in the scale.
July 3, 2023
He is excellent at getting daily photo ops published.
July 3, 2023
+many
July 3, 2023
When Liz resigned (pushed), the decision to re-elect the new PM should have been returned to the party membership and not a coronation by the parliamentary party
July 3, 2023
The Parliamentary party should lose the right to come up with the shortlist. Our problem in all elections are the shortlists.
July 3, 2023
A well written and thoughtful post, as ever. I for one am grateful you arenāt in government and subject to collective Cabinet responsibility so please keep plugging away. Having said that, itās very difficult to be optimistic about this PM or our countryās future. I would go so far as to say that the Conservatives in government are solely responsible for effectively destroying the rationale for the following once commonplace phrases that used to help define our way of life: āMade in Englandā, āit couldnāt happen hereā, āitās a free countryā, āproud to be Britishā.
July 3, 2023
May I add āsafe as the Bank of Englandā āthe world does not owe you a livingā āship-shape and Bristol Fashionā and āmind your own businessā?
July 3, 2023
I’d much rather a Prime Minister or any Minister for that matter, be a better manager than speaker, but Sunak seems to be neither. I can overlook the speaking bit.
Politics took a nose dive on the froth versus substance with the advent of ‘the Blair’,and now the celebrity/tv bludgeoned masses seem to look more for the celebrity ‘wow’ factor in those handling the serious business of running a nation.
I note the Treasury is said to be concerned with the banks taking it upon themselves to dictate people’s political views by closing accounts. Well, that really is astoundingly cheeky given the government (past and present) have helped create this air of terror. Isn’t that why most businesses now are more about showing their woke credentials than anything else, for fear of the beady eye falling on them and pointing a finger.
In an age where to not have a bank account makes life extremely impossible, what about the ‘human rights’ aspect. This is given as the main reason we can’t stop endless boats full of young fighting age men pitching up here at their leisure, never to be returned, yet the centuries old freedom and rights of the heritage population are hammered day in day out.
Just a few reasons for the poor performance in the polls for Conservatives. We expect all this from Labour/Liberals but the sting is unbearable when it’s inflicted by those you trust to do away with all this destructive nonsense.
July 3, 2023
I note that the reasons for Farages bank accounts being closed are not mentioned, proven or even justified. Nothing has been mentioned, except under Parliamentary privilege. That makes me wonder why! No doubt Farage would sue anyone telling whopping lies about him outside of Parliamentary privilege, and he would win.
July 4, 2023
NOTHING justifies the removal of banking facilities. You know that Katie Hopkins, Lawrence Fox and many others suffered the same fate? Farage, with his Radio show, never mentioned that.
July 3, 2023
@Michelle +1
July 3, 2023
This is simply the compliance departments of the Banks covering their backsides over PEPs (Politically Exposed People). Originally conceived as a way to control corrupt money from overseas politicians getting into the system, now just about anyone connected to a ‘politician’ can be effected (and have been). Sir John is probably already on someones watch list. This should be very simple for Westminster to sort out but I doubt that they will. Too busy playing internal games to actually run the country…
Farage isn’t the first to be affected, he’s simply better at highlighting the problem
July 3, 2023
Our banking system is no longer fit for purpose.
Try working with the low income or the homeless. For example, someone in emergency accommodation or on the streets often cannot get a job because they have no bank account to be paid into because they have no address, creating a vicious cycle… Likewise many bank accounts now require a minimum monthly payment in to open or have a monthly cost, both of which are things people cannot guarantee they have, and the situation with informal clubs is ridiculous.
With the loss of postal orders and the approaching shut down of cheques, I’m uncertain how people who cannot get bank accounts are meant to pay bills, tax liabilities, or anything else. Why, in the digital age, the government thinks driving people back to storing money in mattresses is a good idea I am unsure.
July 3, 2023
Just goes to show how out of touch No 10 is. It was obvious when he came out with these 5 tests that he thought they would all go his way and he could spin improvement, just as the woeful Steve Barclay did yesterday with the NHS.
But you have had 13 years to sort it out and thrown billions after billions at it without the scintilla of an improvement plan and in trouble a year before an election, suddenly a staffing plan appears that apparently will take staffing levels to 2 million and zero structural change. Are you having a laugh?
You are claiming 20000 more police but it was you who cut them back in the first place and clear up rates are appalling.
You and the BOE put up inflation and then interest rates. Then to claim credit for them falling is bolleaux.
We have egregious tax rates with more cowardly stealth take to come whilst public sector waste and inefficiency goes unchallenged.
Sunak doesnāt have the bottle to take on the One Nation Tory left to get the migration bill down.
You continue to blame everyone but yourselves. Gove (mr pomposity) the latest about house builders.
You are crumbling in the face of left wing minority activists closing down free speech and in hock to diversity and equality. Top army officers sacked for agreeing the obvious. We see public sector recruitment anything but if you are a white male. So potentially mediocrity over talent. The civil service has you by the balls and you are too weak to push back.
Your net zero plan is ruining the country and costing us billions for not much.
The army is woefully undermanned, again you are
You have failed to take advantage of Brexit indeed crumble to the EU at every opportunity, frightened to tell the public its successes.
Re wilding over home grown food output.
Ignoring home energy resources, so importing at higher costs to us etc.
And no growth plan. Wow!
And so the pretence of Government goes on.
July 3, 2023
+++ excellent
Youāve summed it all up.
The woeful saga.
I could weep ( well I do!) at the WASTE of those original 80 majority seats.
At the death of Mr Amess.
At the destruction of my country and the trashing of all our lives. And all..and allā¦.
How could they be so utterly cruelā¦or dense..or just unbelievably hubristic?
July 3, 2023
Woow I think that just about covers it.
July 3, 2023
Well said, Nigl. The country is doomed, thanks to ALL politicians over the last 40+ years.
July 3, 2023
Say’s it all really.
Useless people with no real and practical idea in charge.
July 3, 2023
Well said , but who is listening
Not the government
July 3, 2023
Itās the Tory Parliamentary Party fault that the country will return a Labour Party to government ā¦.or is that their plan
July 3, 2023
Nigl, is the lack of a staffing plan when the NHS has thousands of managers and head honchos being paid more than the prime Minister, not their failure? Can the government not expect NHS England to do its job without micromanagement from the Minister other than to establish clear objectives and a defined purpose?
The first thing I would do if I were a regional NHS manager (especially in Cities and high tourism spots) is ensure all hospitals have a billing receptionist who takes payment from travel insurance cards and the EU medical card or private payments for treatments other than emergency treatment to save life as other nations all around the world do.
July 3, 2023
‘The UK Emissions Trading Scheme Authority has announced a package of reforms to tighten limits on industrial, power and aviation emissions from 2024.’ Net Zero Watch ……..just another net-zero kicking
July 3, 2023
And in or her news I see Shapps is insisting on a petrol price checker website to be set up if not voluntarily he will legislate.
Pathetic interventionist rubbish and of cause more unnecessary costs. Actually I get a regular update on prices by e Mail already, I am quite capable of spotting prices as I drive around and driving miles to save pennies. Err spending to save I donāt think so.
And similarly Hunt is taking credit for the Banks to look after mortgage holders in trouble. Utter rubbish. What he claims with a big fanfare was standard practice when I was in the industry 20years ago.
The supermarkets laughed at him when he accused them of profiteering showing again how out of touch you are.
Sums it up.
July 3, 2023
Hunt’s made a statement on the cancellation of bank accounts of those who ‘hold CONTROVERSIAL views’. Though this is welcome I would just like to point out to Mr Hunt that those who have had their bank accounts cancelled are victims for expressing A DIFFERENT AND CONTRARY OPINION NOT A CONTROVERSIAL OPINION
God almighty, it shows just how far we have fallen into the abyss of left-wing extremism that asserting the basic facts of biological life and wanting to protect children from sexualisation is labelled ‘controversial’
THIS NATION IS LOST to the Left and your party John is partly responsible.
It’s utterly heartbreaking
July 3, 2023
Wise advice, but the people do not see him as their PM, he was not elected to office or chosen by the members. He uses words and Twitter to suggest he is working on the manifesto pledges, but results show otherwise. A lame duckš
July 3, 2023
Just saying what you think people want to hear won’t make Sunak popular – the job isn’t a popularity contest! You’re right JR, we need action that shows change!
I heard confirmation at the weekend that it is definitely the net zero policies that’s causing the economy to fail, there was a description of why.
A popular slogan growing is “Just Stop Net Zero”!
July 3, 2023
Letās get bumper stickers made!
July 3, 2023
The need for so much reform is prone to lead to Reform in government. The Reform Partyās will, policies and likely capabilities show better signs of doing what is right than the present disgraced bunch currently in power. If a Reform Govt that achieves quality results can be reached at the next election, waiting another 18 months would be worth it.
July 3, 2023
“there is dissatisfaction in Downing Street with the state of the polls and the lack of credit going to the PM”
They really don’t get it then, do they?
When an unelected placeman parachutes himself in to replace the elected person. The chutzpah and cheek of this man to overrule what was democratically decided!
When that placeman is the very person who caused the inflation disaster which he so-say has the recipe to cure, but it’s clear it’s the wrong recipe
When he’s a technocrat without any real convictions and works on ideas passed on by other out-of-touch technocrats
When he’s clearly doing little to nothing to enact his 5 aims anyway.
People will have no confidence.
There is no way back.
July 3, 2023
If Sunak wants the polls to change he has to deliver , and unequivocally deliver , people are fed up to their back teeth with talk , starting with the most contentious area migration, he gets no Brownie points for being in a death spiral with the judiciary over Rwanda , he needs to change the rules of the game, rules that are his to change , and that he so far hasn’t shows he just wants more of the same.
e.g. If Braverman can call an emergency that over rides to rights of an Essex community and have migrants forced on them by taking over and using a nearby air base as a migrant dumping ground, then why can’t an emergency be called that benefits British people? Like declaring the migrant situation an emergency ( which you have over the Essex airbase) and so setting aside the 1951 Convention.
July 3, 2023
āPrime Minister wanting to be a good managerā my comment, when is he going to start just being the manager of the UK
āpursuing other policy aims like renegotiating the EU settlement, doubling down on more moves to net zero, and seeking to intervene in so many businessesĀ will get in the way of bringing about the five aimsā – just grandstanding for sound bites, personal gratification and ego so as to avoid being a manager of the UK.
The Conservative Party needs to just focus on the things they have said to get elected. They need to focus, really focus on creating a strong, resilient and self-reliant economy. Only then will they have the money to fund all the fanciful dreams. Or in other words stop being disciples of the unelected Socialist WEF and just become āConservativeā.
The electorate voted by a massive majority for a Conservative Government, and what did they get?
July 3, 2023
āā¦ā¦..there is nothing wrong with the policy framework.ā
Sorry, but there is everything wrong with the policy framework.
The continued unilateral implementation of the economy destroying Net Zero Strategy ā Build Back Greener to āsave the planetā from a non-existent CAGW and pushed by communists, globalists, wealthy elites, energy grifters and Malthusians is the basis of our inflation and rapidly declining economy.
There is no intention to grow the economy, if fact quite the reverse. They want us to return to a pre-industrial feudalism/communism where we will āown nothingā with severely reduced living standards and population size.
The giveaway was when our PM, then Chancellor, said at COP26:
āSo our third action is to rewire the entire global financial system for Net Zero.ā
July 3, 2023
PS :
Unilateral Net Zero requires such fundamental changes to our lifestyle, health and wealth that it should be decided by a referendum.
July 3, 2023
Fully agree
July 3, 2023
Everything you say is pertinent to putting us on the right path so I hope it is taken on board.
I cannot tell if it is coordinated or haphazard, but their appears a creeping disease in society that needs to be addressed before it destroys the foundations of what we believe we are. It has a number of variants.
1. The ongoing censorship of established core english literature because it is thought to be out of tune with society as we know it today. The escence of our english library is that it tells us of life in the past. Cease tampering with it.
2. The debasing of our history and those who were the major players. We were by no means perfect and made terrible mistakes that laced the good we achieved. It is history, learn from it, but do not expect the current population to carry any residual guilt for it. Removing statues or damaging them achieves nothing.
3. Academic cancellations and de- platforming are the very antithisis of what education is about. Long ago at my school we had every newspaper from the FT to the Daily Worker available in the library daily. Read digest and filter before coming to conclusions was the lesson. What is going on in universities and some schools is akin to what you would expect in communist China. It needs to stop.
4. The indoctrination of the young in schools with alien anti family gender ideas that are inappropriate for children experiencing the confusion of puberty. Stick with biology while offering sympathy to their confusion at this time of developing sexuality. Selling life and body changing solutions is totally inappropriate.
5.Cancelations of bank accounts, building society accounts, and payment systems for people the provider disagrees with politically, is as I read it , totally against the rules of the FCA. It has to be stopped unequivocally by government at threat of the removal of any licence to operate. We already have a political power base at work within our civil service, we cannot tolerate one within financial services. It is as insidious, if not worse, than the remkval kf water, gas, and electricity. Put an emphatic stop to it.
July 3, 2023
An interesting article in the Daily Mail today about the woeful mismanagement at Woking. Councils really should stick to their knitting, and be kept under stricter supervision from grown-ups. This is something that needs fixing – quickly.
July 3, 2023
I lived there for a few years. It was all going on back then. Truly shocking that they were allowed to borrow such enormous sums for speculative investment that should have been ultra vires. The list of those who secured investment funding from the Council might make interesting reading. Clearly, banks and auditors were negligent in not scrutinising the Council’s accounts.
July 3, 2023
Sunak thought four of his five pledges would be achieved naturally with no action at all from him. It turns out the Treasury and NHS forecasts he based this on were wildly wrong and he’ll fail to meet them all beyond maybe a near-unmeasurable amount of growth.
The stop the boats one is interesting. Beyond gifting more money to France he’s done precisely nothing at all but he still claimed when there was a 20% short-term reduction recently that this showed his (non-existent) policy “was working”. So when this reduction merely turned out to be due to the weather and numbers raced ahead again afterwards why didn’t he say that this proved that his policy was NOT working ?
Still, the majority of Conservative MPs apparently wanted this “adult” in charge so good luck to them retaining their seats after parading their poor judgement given he’s turned out to be useless.
July 3, 2023
Hi sir John
Why do you not have a better position in government?
July 3, 2023
Because we have no Conservative Party in which he would be treasured!
July 3, 2023
Simples, he’s a Conservative.
July 3, 2023
Four: recognise that hamstringing the forces in society that are creative, innovative and productive with taxes and regulations will make it much more difficult to reach any of the goals.
July 3, 2023
Dear Mr. Redwood,
I did not come across the weekend articles you are referring to but truly the inhabitants of Downing Street must exist in a different world to that of the rest of us. Dissatisfaction with the polls? PM lack of credit? Do they think the Conservatives should be ahead in the polls and the PM a shoe-in for the next general election?
A government should not need polling to tell it that it needs to get rampant inflation under control, cut ballooning debt, slash huge waiting lists, restore growth to a moribund economy and stop the boats. These are all self-evident; the government should not need to be told what it needs to focus on. They are not just things that voters want; they are essential aspects of running the country. Something at which this government has failed.
The British people are not stupid. They see that more laws will not stop the boats. They understand that 600,000 migrants in a single year is simply unsustainable. They know that more and more wind and solar power cannot replace fossil fuels in their entirety. They realise that forcing people to give up their petrol / diesel cars and move to electric cannot be achieved by 2030. They recoil at the thought and cost of heat pumps. And yet they have to listen to government ministers who pretend that all this and more is possible when they cannot even deliver the basics of sound government.
July 4, 2023
They have to listen to government ministers pretending that a man can put on a frock, lippy and high heels and magically become a woman.
The level of delusion on display would seem to indicate that the very limited confessions of imbibing various illegal substances we’ve been told about is another case of “being extremely economical with the actualite.”
July 3, 2023
John Redwood perseveres from the backbenches to guide this strange cabinet toward solutions.
The fact that he has to do this tells us all we need to know about the talents of said cabinet. Even worse, they don’t listen. Something’s not right about all this. The cabinet seem to have an agenda which no one voted for and which they are implementing by stealth. I wonder what that can be………
July 3, 2023
Unlike Sir John here I do have political problems with a Prime Minister not being a visionary speaker because a Prime Minister vitally needs to win General Election(s) and one is unlikely to do so unless one can present and inspire with a relevant vision for the people. So a mere manager is in the wrong job if he is Prime Minister.
I also have a major problem with a Prime Minister publicly (rather than just privately) setting himself (even worse making promises over) major tasks he is not going to fulfil as that is a major and extremely public sign of incompetence.
So I say it is essential to change the Prime Minister now for somebody better able to fit the job requirements of Prime Minister as well as being somebody more committed to putting ‘Conservativism’ into practice even if ‘public servants’ don’t like it!
July 3, 2023
New polling commissioned by Tony Blairās thinktank shows that far more voters prefer the UK moving closer to the EU instead of the divergence that the fewer hardright libertarian brexiteers would prefer.
Rishi Sunak seems better placed than his predecessors to do that for the short term i.e. until the general elections. The UK government call this a āmore mature phaseā.
July 3, 2023
PvL- Well if think tank can get any outcome it wants if it asks the right people! Iāve never been interviewed by a think tank in my life. The people in my family, friends, acquaintances, none of them have been polled. We trust Blair, the man who claims there were weapons of mass-destruction, about as much as we now trust the Tories to actually deliver the Brexit you think they were delivering š.
We call your āthe mature phaseā, bend over backwards stage and just take whatever the EU demands without fairness or reciprocity, it is frankly quite pathetic and is just turning people more against the EU but you just choose not to see it, please yourself, I know Iāve purposely stopped buying EU produce it might be a little show of defiance but its what Iām able to do.
July 4, 2023
@a-tracy: too much hate for the EU. Maybe stemming from the times that the EU was the scapegoat for every imaginable problem. If Blair cannot be trusted, maybe some news sources couldn’t be either. Since leaving the EU it must have dawned on many that some problems were just home-grown. After Britain had left the EU, the hate expressions have diminished as well. I don’t read EUSSR quite as often as before. Apart from you, I don’t read much about people turning against the EU.
July 4, 2023
‘hate’ a very strong word Peter.
I don’t hate anything or anybody. Don’t put such a nasty word in my mouth because it suits you to.
I don’t trust all news sources. I read a capacious amount from all sides of the argument, unlike yourself it seems.
Some problems like regions losing jobs to Europe? When manufacturing got divided up, the UK lost too much Peter, just as it is now decided your country will no longer be farmers, we can’t produce vans we were told, now we are hog tied.
Some problems include wages being held down due to Eastern EU citizens willing to live on the lowest wages by house sharing and claiming UK benefits at UK levels to send home and their child benefits in another country supporting their partner not to work. (They are on the rise now, more homegrown HGV drivers, and we are starting to demand more British NHS workers and carers.)
Some problems like the majority of British citizens who don’t break the law and partake in illegal activities getting taxed by the EU for those they guesstimate do.
I could go on. I don’t hate Europeans. I have many friends, speak three European languages and love the people who love us.
July 4, 2023
@a-tracy:
So we substitute āhate forā with ādissatisfied withā.
Naturally I expect the EU27 to serve its interests. Many smaller EU countries were impressed by EU27 sticking up for the small R.O.I. during brexit negotiations, it shows unity.
We always have to compete and we donāt blame others: The current high intensity bio-industry with twice as many mega stables as 10 years ago in the very small Netherlands is clearly unsustainable. But weāre inventive. We will move to more vertical farming, greenhouse farming, seed-improving, lager exporting . . . weāll just move higher up the value ladder. If some farmers may migrate to the UK youād soon be growing more of your own food! š
Strong country-wide unions prevent practices of too cheaply hiring foreign workers.
Are we taxing the British??? Thatās news to me.
Anyway, we still buy a few British products (tea, chocolate shreddies for the grandchildren) as Iām not defiant against the economical harm that the UK caused in certain continental sectors with Brexit.
July 5, 2023
I am happy with ‘dissatisfied with’. It takes two partners to make a relationship, not one expected to grovel on their knees. We were told we had a trade agreement then we read small UK business people saying it is impossible to trade with the EU; that doesn’t seem like a free and fair trade agreement to me.
As for the R.O.I when they gained their ‘independence’ we didn’t continually want to give them a punishment beating. We bought lots of their exports, we bailed them out when they required it, and we allowed them a common travel area, heck they can even get operations done in the UK, and I bet none are rebilled to the Rep of Ireland. When Vadakar was so anti-uk I will admit I stopped buying Irish dairy products and meat.
Yes, from 2014, we were taxed yearly for taxes we didn’t collect from ‘black market’ guestimates that the EU wanted a cut of.
Yes, the odd little thing like that might slip in; there is not much choice if I want to buy pasta. I’m talking about white goods and cars. But I’m becoming rather Italian and buying more British products where I can because I don’t like the way the EU is stopping small creators trading whilst we allow imports because our commercial border isn’t ready yet. Quid pro quo.
July 4, 2023
A-tracy
The latest figures about EU support in the UK Economist shows you are wrong
Reply All the years we were in the EU with polls showing how unpopular with voters did not mean we left.
July 4, 2023
Bill, I’ll repeat – The people in my family, friends, acquaintances, none of them have been polled. I’ve rechecked many of them recently.
Our press seems to be only telling one side of leaving. I’m beginning to wonder why. People aren’t being told how much they’d be paying right now to be still in. What bailouts would we be online for? What extra fees and fines on Chinese imports, drugs, and prostitution would be magic’d up.
We are spending so much more than ever on the NHS, but it seems unreported, invisible to people; covid has had a much more significant impact on the NHS than leaving the EU, yet you wouldn’t know that reading most reporters.
The lower earners in the UK are keeping more of their earnings (the personal allowances are now Ā£12570 for both tax and insurance) and have had the biggest over-inflation increases to the NMW in the UK, yet we don’t hear that at all. Some energy bailouts were very generous, and careful people saved some of that money; we don’t hear that.
I see and hear average-wage people spending money all the time at the moment, yet to read the press; they’re all in a food bank. It appears some can budget and save money to go on holiday, fix their driveways, replace windows and kitchens and do up their gardens.
The BoE screwed up inflation, JR gave them sound advice, which was totally ignored. It is now squeezing people too tightly with mortgages, especially those with high multiples that didn’t realise the under 2% inflation of the past 15 years of Tory management was the unique once-in-a-lifetime benefit they should have been taking full advantage of by paying down more than they needed. Low interest became expected even though it wasn’t ever at that level in history, no-one complained that pensioners and savers (anyone not in a final salary public sector or old big industry pension) were suffering poor annuities, returns and interest.
July 6, 2023
@a-tracy: Your comments on trade to me show: “āŖā« you don’t know what you’ve got till its gone ā«”. There have been so many pre-referendum warnings about “non tariff barriers” from the EU, but apparently, your vote leave campaigners didn’t tell you the truth. You had the single market, now you’ve lost it. The trade deal covers tariffs only.
July 6, 2023
And the new trade deal should cut both ways Peter, all I know is this government needs, once it has put in place alternative lines, the exact same terms on to the EU and until it does I have no respect for our side of the negotiation at all, you are quite correct in that they are giving the EU a free trade deal but not getting one in return. Your exports continue whilst your EU has put up barriers. I donāt blame the EU I blame the UK for not being ready after 5 years (covid or not) if we applied the same terms to your exporters they would soon put pressure on the EU to free up some terms for us, our weakness is facilitating and unfair, unbalanced trade flow and I have never said I blame the EU for that. I have said if our government wonāt get on and do it then Iāll make my own protest and encourage others to.
We canāt have your Single Market Peter, because with your Single Market comes all sorts of regulations on UK businesses that we donāt currently have because many have been put in place since we left.
July 3, 2023
Ah – Tony Blairās think tank! šš¤£ that must be right. Blair thought the British people loved the EU and wanted to remain in it. He was only 180 degrees out.
July 3, 2023
I am not sure they would want to move closer to France – or come to that the Netherlands, given recent events. Mr Blair is an expert in commissioning polls that give him the answer he wants to hear.
July 3, 2023
Tony Blairs thinktank. Ha ha ha. We don’t want the EU Mr EU in any shape or form. Any mature approach by the Torys will lead to their total destruction.
July 4, 2023
@Timaction: what would you gain from “destroying” us?
July 4, 2023
Peter don’t be so sensitive, the ‘us’ Timeaction refers to is this present group of Conservative MPs not people in the EU.
July 3, 2023
Well that’s a lie but what are we to expect from anything connected to Bliar
July 4, 2023
Most comments above don’t trust the polls because Blair commissioned them.
So why not google for current brexit polls yourselves. I just did and get similar results.
Are no polls in Britain to be trusted?
July 4, 2023
Only election results, called a poll, with traditional counting mechanics are to be trusted Peter. The rest are part of the psycho-ops mechanism attempting to āenforce a viewā.
We gave our answer to the EU question. It was Leave. What part donāt you understand?
July 4, 2023
@Lynn Atkinson: I do understand the referendum result Lynn. I have since argued that it is better for you to be outside the EU. That leaves open the possibility to be closer to the EU than now. Leave campaigners like e.g. Daniel Hannan (an ERG founder) originally opted for staying in the Single Market outside the EU.
Some Brexiteers have radicalised.
July 4, 2023
PvL, the tv news, never discusses gains of independence. People are being bamboozled. They aren’t told what the costs of being in right now would be. The savings from the fees, fines and other taxes of RoW imports and exports, what the Rotterdam effect means on our trade figures. We see you.
They are not told the true spending on the NHS since 2016, instead, they’re being told the money on the side of the bus isn’t going in, it is much, much more for less and less it seems.
July 3, 2023
Who does the political organisation poll? Not one person I know has ever been asked any questions.
I want Rishi to be interviewed and to show how much extra funding has gone into the NHS in ‘real terms’ since 2016. I want to know how NHS England has divided that funding up. Which trusts are failing waiting time targets, and by how much? Which are achieving them. I am sick of false statements being issued on social media; why is the government just accepting all the blame and people spreading false statistics?
Has extra funding gone into Education or not in ‘real terms’? How much and what is achieved? When we hear teachers are so stressed, they teach to ‘the test’, and other lessons go to the wayside. Why do you do this set test? The High Schools don’t trust the results and do a ‘hidden test’ in the first year to set the students. Why doesn’t the government do hidden tests without questions being released?
July 3, 2023
@johnredwood – Jul 2 – The Prime Minister is said to be unhappy he gets no credit for what he does. He has set five good aims. He will get more credit when he delivers them.
A Conservative Government of 13 years, nothing to show for it. The PM continuing the rot all talk and do nothing, he has killed the economy, he presides over the highest tax take in 70 years. High inflation, he raised costs so caused it. Highest growth in the State ever seen, greatest expenditure on the NHS nothing to show for it. Or in other words the Conservative Government is spending taxpayer money as if there is no tomorrow (at this rate there wont be), and delivering on nothing that was promised to get elected.
So credit for what he does? Does he mean the speeches?
July 4, 2023
IanB, well, there are things to show for it, so why aren’t the Tories loud and shouting about them? That is the question.
July 3, 2023
Is number 10 making policy because it is good policy, or because it sounds good and they imagine it is what people want?
The only effects HMG is making are bad ones – rationality and common sense have been removed from governance. We are in an era of treachery and change. The establishment has decided which way we are going, and they will drag the rest of us along, kicking and screaming, but as they control every aspect of justice, the army and the police, they think the can do what they want.
They are winning because they are so good at indoctrination, helped so willingly by the mass media.
July 3, 2023
policy but no action.
July 3, 2023
Sir John’s comments today give Sunak a slight tick on the back in not disagreeing with his 5 prime aims , however the concluding views emphasise where the gap lies and that is motivating the growth of the economy . Investors and investment are now choosing other markets because the doom and despair that now exists here drives them away . Sunak does not have the overall persona to be our Prime Minister ; his private wealth and life isolate him from the ordinary voter . He is a man of integrity and that is important but his efforts to lead in a way that the public can support are lacking ; the same applies to the majority of the team he has chosen to have around him .
July 3, 2023
A very good attack for a competing Party, doesn’t sound much like support to me. 11.30
July 3, 2023
Very good clear advice. I would go further and insist the Windsor Framework must go. Concoct a facesaver around the Unionist refusal to go back into the Assembly, which is after all the only reason we were given for having the WF in the first place. Once it has gone, there can be serious growth reforms, such as abolishing VAT, bringing down Corporation Tax, removing negative EU regulation, and turning the whole country into a Free Port.
July 3, 2023
Rose
+1
July 3, 2023
I’ve forgotten what the five aims are, but I’m pretty sure that they do not include the restoration of Northern Ireland as a fully integral part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
This is worth reading:
https://thecritic.co.uk/the-windsor-framework-is-failing/
“Over the past week, political pundits have again debated at length the merits of Brexit, as well as its problems, to mark the seventh anniversary of the referendum result. Unfortunately, the discussion rarely touched upon the status of Northern Ireland, which was effectively left behind in the European Union so that the rest of Britain could make its departure.”
July 3, 2023
Here’s something else which is also worth reading, at least by those who wish to read such things:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/decision-no-22023-of-joint-committee-established-by-the-agreement-on-the-withdrawal-of-the-uk-from-the-eu-adding-2-newly-adopted-union-acts-to-annex
“Decision No 2/2023 of Joint Committee established by the Agreement on the withdrawal of the UK from the EU: adding 2 newly adopted Union acts to Annex 2 to the Windsor Framework”
“This decision was adopted at the Withdrawal Agreement Joint Committee meeting on 3 July 2023.”
Following through the link provided, Article 2 states:
“This Decision shall enter into force on the day following that of its adoption.”
And it was “Done at Brussels, 3 July 2023”, by James Cleverly and MaroÅ” Å efcovic.
July 3, 2023
I thought under the Windsor Accord that weād gifted NI to the EU ā¦therefore the UK is now only the British Isles
July 3, 2023
The same with the Withdrawal Agreement when we gifted our fisheries to the French
July 3, 2023
Denis we must be the only people in the world that would want to mark such a thing as brexit ie. a complete break in relations with the largest trading bloc on the planet, a bloc so well off and located right on our doorstep – it’s all pure madness of course for which our children’s children will not recover.
If anyone wants to disagree then please give a good reason why we should mark brexit as an occasion – it’s seven years now since the vote and what have we gained? apart from taking back control – hard to say anything else but am afraid we were horribly lied to.
July 3, 2023
“a complete break in relations”
Thanks for that, James4, duly noted as one of the most stupid things anybody has ever said about Brexit.
July 4, 2023
No “stupid” back at you if we had a Norweigan style relationship with them? if we had a Swiss or other similar I could say a ‘break’ but since we have a relationship that resembles that which they have with Outer Mongolia – to me that us a complete break. All only reinforced in my mind when I am standing in the non EU immigration queue at the airport – then when I see the boats with illegals coming across the channel and we are not even part of the dublin convention anymore. Stupid indeed
July 4, 2023
” we have a relationship that resembles that which they have with Outer Mongolia”
Thanks, another piece of complete idiocy to be put on your record.
July 4, 2023
Dennis – Cooper
You never learn the art of objective arguments do you?
July 4, 2023
So you too believe there has been “a complete break in relations” … what a pair you are.
July 4, 2023
Have you taken a look at the EU recently? Deindustrialization and flight of capital from Germany, France in flames, Greece, Italy, Spain bankrupt, the Netherlands reverting to (authoritarianism Ed)where the Government dictates who you can sell your own home to and for what price etc etc? Poland preparing for war, Hungary demanding self-determination. The ECB and the Euro basket cases. The EU Commission a laughing stock ā¦
Escaping that catastrophe is in itself a near-death experience.
One wonders whether the native EU populationās children will ever have children ā¦ will they last that long?
July 5, 2023
So much unsubstantiated nonsense
July 4, 2023
James, it takes two to make a ‘relationship’.
The EU doesn’t expect everyone that trades with it and that it trades with to be joined by the hip. If it wants to cut its nose off to spite its face it is about time our government stops pandering to it and gets itself in order and applies the same restrictions after opening up alternative trade lines with other nations to fill the gaps.
July 3, 2023
Road siding onto our gardenā¦..
Two stolen road signs initially dumped in anti social nextdoor front garden.
A many-weeks parked campervan.
The continual site of hour long engine idling and super loud music.
Piles of earth seen being barrowed from a neighbouring house on Bank Holiday Monday
A large, open plastic milk flagon of what can only be urine.
(Weāve seen worse in plastic bags).
Luckily the councillor charged with roads and traffic etc is wholly concerned with achieving net zero
So thatāll help!!
Lovely country isnāt it?
July 3, 2023
It seems these 5 tasks are to go the same way as the 2019 Manifesto promises.
However, it is becoming quite clear to me that anti-British forces are everywhere in this country. If it is not the die-hard remainers within Parliament (and ex-Parliament), it is those middle ‘calluses’ who have nowt better to do than prevent the real workers from going to their places of work in a dumb attempt to turn us back to the middle ages and despite their obvious hypocrisy over “oil” and carbon based energy sources.
If it is not those it is the teachers union and the Unis swamping their students with left wing dogma and latterly, I now see the same in the Court of Appeal when the “rights” of illegal immigrants trump the rights of British citizens to be protected in their own country. What other country in the world has to tolerate such blatant abuse of democracy?
Perhaps the PM should add a sixth task, to eliminate all indoctrination and thus save the Nation? Eventually.
July 3, 2023
If he fails in his 5 aims will he resign?
July 3, 2023
Completely off topic, just for a little amusement, I’m sorting out old files and going through one of the many Reading Evening Post folders I came across one of my letters they printed over twenty years ago, June 17 2003, about Martin Salter, then the Labour MP for Reading West, and then as now an enthusiastic angler. With due modesty I have to say that it was not a bad letter:
“MP Salter – defender of imperial measures”
“HOW disappointing that Martin Salter MP should report the weight of his catch in old-fashioned pounds and ounces. (Evening Post, Thursday, June 12)
When a fishmonger persisted in using these antique “imperial” units, as requested by his customers, he was threatened with the removal of his licence and livelihood.
As I recall, Mr Salter dismissed that case as simple anti-European nonsense. Yet there he is in Canada, which I had understood to be progressive and therefore metricated, happily catching carp by the pound, while in his own country it will very soon be a criminal offence to even display the price of fish by the pound.
And if he got his way, it would also be impossible to pay in pounds and pence.
For the benefit of those who prefer the system of units used by the countries that lost the Second World War, Mr Salter’s largest carp weighed 15,196 grams.
May I venture to suggest that it might have grown to an even more spectacular size if it had been left alone, rather than being forced to join him in a photo opportunity?”
And I find that he is still doing it, March 8 2023:
https://fightingforfishing.anglingtrust.net/2023/03/08/back-end-beauties/
“… I prefer a straightforward paternoster rig with either a couple of swanshot or a 3/8oz bomb tied on to a six inch link with a four turn water knot and a 14 inch hook trace … The only other tip I would offer is to use as light a glass quiver tip as possible. Iāve got them from 1/2ozs through to 1.5ozs and trust me, it really does make a difference minimising the resistance to a taking perch … four sessions on the canal whilst waiting for the rivers to come back into their banks and had two pound plus fish on three of them … a personal best perch would be a long-awaited four pounder as Iāve lost count of the number Iāve had just a few ounces short of that magic mark.”
July 3, 2023
I see that the government quango the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has criticised supermarket petrol stations for over charging millions over the last three years ā¦.does this also mean that the over charged government VAT will be returned
July 3, 2023
Well done Sir John Redwood.
July 3, 2023
@Denis+Cooper:
According to Bloomberg, the UK government (James Cleverly) called this a āmore mature phaseā. It may not be to the liking of the hard-right Brexiteers, but Northern Ireland keeps following the Single Market. A bit like Norway of Switzerland, one could say.
July 4, 2023
Northern Ireland does not āfollow the single marketā willingly. Does that bother you? I see they have deployed tanks in Switzerland to quell rebellions. Switzerland is becoming just like France – do you think the Swiss will applaud this achievement?
July 4, 2023
Where did you see that Switzerland āhas deployed tanks to quell rebellionsā. You might want to give the benefit of your sources to all readers on this blog.
July 4, 2023
Lynn Atkinson
The argument so superficial and not substantiated that it’s not worth commenting on
July 4, 2023
‘hard-right’ Peter? Because we don’t like Cleverly selling us out.
You know the connotation ‘hard right’ implies, which is why you exercise it. I don’t consider myself hard-right. My husband thinks I’m a bit wishy-washy, lol. Calling people like me hard-right is now making us a bigger group and thus more acceptable.
July 3, 2023
Sir John
A ninth bank has refused to give Nigel Farage a bank account – including Coutts which cancelled the account he had held for many years.
It would appear that the legislation the Government recently implemented which you referred to a day ago, is next to useless when it comes to protecting free speech and preventing banks from cancelling people whose views they don’t like.
July 3, 2023
Donna, +++++, The two assertions yesterday that legislation was already in place does leave me wondering . . . I had been trusting up until then . . . . .
I conclude that my scepticism was fully justified and that there is no effective legislation to protect the status of account holders other than popular derision and outrage.
Nigel Farage is not protected by legislation.
Is it disingenuous to claim that there is effective legislation in place already to assuage the doubters and victims of this dreadful discrimination?
Where should I look for trustworthy information?
Has the number of my sources diminished?
Reply I did not say āeffectiveā or āin placeā
July 4, 2023
Wonderful ….. so now we have a Not-a-Conservative-Government creating ineffective legislation and not putting it into effect anyway.
Welcome to the British Banana Constitutional Monarchy, formerly known as the United Kingdom.
July 3, 2023
I’d suggest that the banks are getting under the table instructions from the Bank of England who in turn are getting suggestion from the Treasury & Chancellor ….after all we have a woke and green government
July 4, 2023
Coutts/ Natwest is circa 50% government (tax payer) owned.
July 4, 2023
Natwest is 38.6% government-owned after 22 May 2023.
And Coutts is indeed part of the Natwest group but operates independently of Natwest.
As for NFās latest lie about the lack of currency exchange with Natwest, maybe he could have a look at natwestinternational.com
But reading the comments on Sir Johnās blog NF has been very successful (again) at putting himself as the man-of-the-people martyrised by the non-āeliteā (cough, cough, cough) Coutts.
July 4, 2023
Do you have proof that it is a lie hefner?
Brave words indeed.
July 6, 2023
And what is your proof it is not a lie. Brave words indeed.
July 4, 2023
Vast increases in bank margins too. Lent to them and get 1% borrow from them and they charge 7% on mortgages and 40% on personal overdrafts. Where is a fair & competitive market this is up to 4000% gross margin. If this is fair and real competition I am a banana!
Where are the fair competition authorities? Cut out the rip off middle men if you can!
July 4, 2023
Anybody looking carefully after their own finances would try not to incur overdraft. So are you not careful?
July 3, 2023
I think you need to concentrate on the NHS firstly as I know of several people who are in a terrible state (one of them my neighbour who has had the ambulance out twice in last week and was taken to hospital again yesterday) and they do not know what is wrong with her other than she has a lump on a kidney. Well take a scan I would say so that you can decipher what is going on there. Another thing get removal of all EU laws and interferences into the sovereign state we supposedly are before the next election or you will not get my vote. My biggest hope was for the Animal Reforms to go through which have been ditched so I am very disappointed with you all.
July 3, 2023
I read through the Westminster Hall debate on the anti ULEZ petitions. It was clear that there was an overwhelming majority opinion that such schemes are about raising revenue and attacking the freedoms of the people, and not about air pollution. Labour were almost entirely absent, with no Labour backbenchers who might have gone against the policy of their dear leader. It is depressing to think that there will be no attempt to legislate against this overreach, presumably because the calculation is that such legislation would be overturned in the next Parliament despite the realities. But failure to legislate is also failure to support the public that has become a hallmark of this government.
July 3, 2023
Mark
The proof that ULEZ zones is not about clean air but money, is that you can pollute as much as you like, if you want to, and can afford to do so.
That simple fact proves the point.
July 4, 2023
Indeed it is just another tax using the ruse of clean air. Sunak could easily stop it but he choose not to. Preferring to allow it to go ahead but blame Khan for it. This government also support all the road blocking agendas.
July 4, 2023
Legal actions against ULEZ extensions starting today I think.
July 4, 2023
Agree, but basically just deliver what the people want. Not globalists & the wealthy! Put British taxpayers & voters first everytime. Even if their requests are disliked unless these can be shown to be incorrect. Boris started well by talking to the voters weekly. That should be reinstated asap.
July 4, 2023
The problem was always that the 5 “pledges” were and are seen as being in the low-hanging fruit category. And he seems unable even to deliver those.
The other problem is that it doesn’t matter if he succeeds or fails in those weak aims, because he’s tainted by how he came to power – many people simply will not vote for the Conservative Party while Sunak/Hunt are in charge, or that God-awful cabinet full of wets/remoaners are in place.
The parliamentary side of the party is being shown up to be a nest of Lib Dem type infiltrators – people have seen enough. Even if you change leader, they will still be skewered by the majority of wets at some later date.
People now see that voting for a conservative leader or manifesto means nothing – they both get ditched.
July 4, 2023
LA.. yes they do, the majority in NI voted to remain in the EU and what they have now is as almost as good as before because they have direct SM access to both markets. Only the old naysayers and creationists of the DUP like to think differently – as an aside the DUP vote accounts for only 25 per cent of the total vote there – at the most
July 5, 2023
Sir John:
Rishi Sunak is an unelected dud. He stood against Liz Truss and lost, yet now he is PM. As far as I can see, he stabbed two PMs in the back to get where he is now, but having done so, has no plan as to what to do next. He is an empty suit. I hope Tory MPs are pleased with him. It seems they wanted him. No-one else did,